Shag Point / Matakaea is a headland and township in East Otago, New Zealand. Both the point and the nearby Shag River take their English name from a seabird, the pied shag. The township extends along a single road, which leaves State Highway 1 nine kilometres to the northeast of Palmerston, at the southern end of a long open bay known as Katiki Beach. The road links the highway with the point itself, three kilometres southeast of the junction. The point is a hilly promontory between Katiki Beach and the mouth of the Shag River. The headland is within the Matakaea Scenic Reserve, which is known for its population of New Zealand fur seals. A historic Māori site, the Matakaea/Shag Point Occupation Site, is located close to the headland. It is listed as a Category II site by

Heritage New Zealand Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga (initially the National Historic Places Trust and then, from 1963 to 2014, the New Zealand Historic Places Trust; in ) is a Crown entity that advocates for the protection of Archaeology of New Zealand, ancest ...

. Geologically, the area is an exemplar of the Katiki Formation, and the site of the discovery of the plesiosaur '' Kaiwhekea katiki''. It is also the location of the oldest characterised

ignimbrite Ignimbrite is a type of volcanic rock, consisting of hardened tuff. Ignimbrites form from the deposits of pyroclastic flows, which are a hot suspension of particles and gases flowing rapidly from a volcano, driven by being denser than the surrou ...

deposit in the South Island at 112 million years ago. Shag Point

References

Headlands of Otago Populated places in Otago Heritage New Zealand Category 2 historic places in Otago {{Otago-geo-stub